Defining "worship" - Use of terms among traditional Gaudiyas

Dear Vaisnavas,

I am curious to know how practitioners of orthodox Gaudiya Vaisnavism distinguish the terms arati, puja, bhajan, upasana and arcana. I have often heard some of these terms used synonymously.

I have also observed that certain words—like "sankirtana", for instance—have taken on meanings very different from their conventional usage. As many of you know, "sankirtana" was (and perhaps still is) popularly used to refer to fund-raising activities in Iskcon.

I guess it goes without saying that one can communicate more effectively when one can choose the most fitting words to express his or her ideas.

Thanks.

arati -- worship with incense, ghee-lamps, water and so forth, generally offered in a circular motion around the Deity
puja -- worship of the Deity involving various other articles, bathing and ornamenting the deities and so forth
bhajan -- a generic word for activities of worship, meditation and chanting
upasana -- much akin to bhajana, often also used in referring to a certain kind of worship in general (ie. "manjari-bhava-upasana")
arcana -- activities related with the Deity, including items such as arati, puja, offering foodstuffs, chanting mantra and so forth

Any disagreements or amendments from anyone?

Thanks, Madhavaji.

I wonder how "bhajana" became commonly used in ISKCON to specifically refer to seated congregational chanting that usually features a harmonium—as opposed to sankirtana (no, the other sankirtana)?

1. There are songs by Narottama das Thakur in which he reveals something of his bhajan.
2. These songs are therefore his bhajans.
3. People do not really know much about what is bhajan, what to speak of engaging in it.
4. Brothers, sing that groovy bhajans music!

Does anyone know how the word "chaunce" came about, the Haribol equivalent of masala? I can't find an entry for it in Merriam-Webster or Britannica, and Google only gives Hare Krishna related sites.

Unless of course "If by chaunce, any Mahumetan come into their handes, they flay him alyue" counts!

My theory: In the 60's a hippy fellow saw Prabhupad or some other Hare Krishnas stirring up the oil and the spices in the kitchen, and he asked, "What's in the sauce?". People picked it up, and it evolved into a fancy French-style cuisine-term, "chaunce" (pronounce: 'shon-s).

It believe is a French word. That would explain why your search turned up nothing. I don't know how it is spelled. Jagat knows French. Jagat?

Found this reference on a French dictionary site:
épiçons = spice *[verb]

No, I can't find it in my French dictionary either, I tried with a couple of alternate spellings. The closest entry I get is "chaud -- "hectic, burning", or otherwise for "caunce", "cauchemar -- hallucination, nightmare". For "spices", I get "assonner", "épice". At any rate, Google would have displayed hits on French pages, too.

By the way, épiçons doesn't sound like a verb to me, rather a plural of a noun. I believe épicer would be the proper verb. At any rate, its becoming épichaunce is not very likely.

I always thought it was from the Hindi (?) chaunk.

http://www.google.com/search?sourceid=navc...=UTF-8&q=chaunk

One Hindustani version is 'chanke' pronounced 'chonkey'.

As in 'chanke the tarkari' ie: spice the cooked subji.

The word 'curry' by the way, is propably an abbreviation of the usual Hindustani 'tarkari'.

But the westerners do funny things with these words, laddhu became 'laglu', bara became 'bharat', even at one stage many American devotees called kurtas 'kirtas' (as in kirtan?) etc.

Hindustanis like Anup Jalota will refer to 'Bhajans' which are composed sung devotional prayers with verses, usually of heartfelt emotional pleading and praise to the Deity. Very personal and intimate, as distinct from 'Aratis' which are all majestic praise, or 'Kirtan' which is either mantra or lila in couplets sung with a chorus repeating each verse.

m-w.com gives the Tamil "kari" as the source. I thought it was from kari/karhi/kadhi pata ("sweet neem") used in various locales across India, and most deliciously in the kadhi that is served hot with rice and made from yoghurt and besan. Mmmmmm.

Here's more info:



from the "Spice Dictionary"

http://www-ang.kfunigraz.ac.at/~katzer/eng...l?Murr_koe.html

A typical Tamil claim.

Why would the British adopt a word from the Tamils for a food they got from the Hindustanis, and when the language of the Empire was Hindustani? (which of course is resented by the Tamils who often think that India revolves around them!)

Also why would the British avoid the common word 'tarkari' for a food, then instead take the name of an uncommon yoghurt dish and apply it to a different food, when the food itself is called Tarkari! Or in lazy Hindi, 'kari'.

Please!

Them tricky Tamils, eh? Subverting the Queen's Own Hindustani like that. Probably bribed some poor sap with mulligatawny and patchouli.

But to clarify, it was me who thought it came from sweet neem and the dish where that spice is predominant, karhi. Brittanica et al define the Tamil "kari" as "sauce".

When I wrote that I had just read how Sri Lanka is sinking back into its problems, and that the LTTE and Prabhakaran is mostly to blame. The whole 'suicide-bomber' culture sickens me, whether in South Asia or the Middle East -nihilistic chauvinism. Despite their Buddhism, I'm on the side of the Sri Lankans, who are a lovely people. I like to think that they represent Indians of the Classical era, just as they believe they are.

As to Tamil 'kari', I can just imagine MW's editors accepting this odd etymology without looking into it.

The Tamils had little to do with the British and more to do with the French, which I suspect is why they favour coffee over tea (and dare I say, why they remain culturally isolated).

Don't worry about it Braj, I'm nursing decades of frustration over the confusion around these type of things, that's what I'm ranting at, not you.

Dear friends,

If this thread is dedicated for linguistic matters, I want to ask a question, received myself about a half-year ago, and failed to investigate exact answer.

Is there any word in Sanskrit, congeneric to Avestian 'spenta', English 'saint', Russian 'svyat' and so on; with the same or near meaning?
I have a suspicion, that second part of the name Vivasvant (-svant) may be related...

Just curious...

Sur

I think spenta and saint are not cognates.

Spenta is directly cognate with english expand with exactly the same meaning. spend is another form.

There may be a link to the english words spirit and space, but also expound and hence speak!

but note that saint is derived from latin sancta, sacra, and according to m-w.com, hittite 'saklai'.

One of the more noticeable links in Indo-European languages, because they remain amazingly constant over millenia, are consonant combinations like 'sp' 'tm' and especially 'st', eg sanskrit sthan is still very present in the english words state, stand, establish, stop, stable, stabilise...etc where the meaning is preserved exactly.

Therefore the key to finding descendants of Spenta is the 'sp', not the 'nt' which in later Persian became 'nd'.

Here's an interesting one for you, though. There was some talk amongst linguists that the Russian word 'Shaman' should be the same as ancient Indic 'Sramana' found often in the expression 'Sramanas and Brahmanas' in the edicts of Ashok, and taken to refer to Buddhist monks.

Dear adiyen,

thanks for your hints. I started to investigate word 'shaman' and found never previously seen by me site with Russian etymological dictionary. I looked for both 'shaman' and 'svyat-'.

As for 'shaman', you are right - it's from 'shraman'. It's the late adoption from Evenk language, and means pagan priest of Siberian nationalities. Pagan priest of ancient Russian/Slavic people is named 'vedun/vedma' (from 'veda' - "sacred knowledge") (means 'witch') or 'koldun' (means 'warlock'), but never 'shaman'.

As for 'svyat-' - it's really related with Avestian 'spaenta' with meaning 'saint' and with Vedik 'zvAntas' with meaning "prosper, flourish" (and some other words, like old-Prussish 'swenta-' and so forth). Relation with Latin 'sanctus' and derivatives is not elicit.

Also there are no links in this dictionary with 'expand', 'spend', but it's obvious, after you said this, that it's true.

Thanks alot!

Some of the local Hare Krishna folks say that the local name of Finland, "Suomi", is derived from "Swami", because we have so many enlightened individuals in this country. Some also say that Scandinavia is derived from Skandanabha, the navel, or center, of Skanda the god of war, because the region was the origin of Vikings known for their warrior nature and journeys of conquest.

I've also heard a couple of other good "etymologies", I can't think of any others for now.

As for the "sankirtan" meaning fund-raising activities of various sorts, it is interesting that the actual sankirtan of parading around the streets chanting became coined "going for harinam" instead.

Now that we unveiled the "chaunk", is there an English equivalent anyone knows of?

sauté ?

Isn't that also a French word? The English would be 'fried spices'.

So, instead of "now we prepare the chaunce", "now we fry the spices". But "fried spices" sounds almost like a separate preparation to me, like french fries or something.